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The story of Monster is undoubtly very good, but also very complex. I would greatly appreciate it if someone who is a bit more familiar (having read the manga a few times perhaps?) could post a simple (or not so simple, if you feel up to it) timeline. It would be a great help. Thanks!

I was thinking of making a crude one once the anime is completely subbed.

Here's a VERY crude timeline, which focuses solely on the twins and Tenma's journey to find them.

1960s - Bonaparta begins the "Monster" project. With Capek as his right hand man, they attempt to create the perfect Monster through readings of disturbing illustration books to chosen children, including Bonaparta's own son.

~1975 - Twins' father and mother met and decided to run away from experiment. Bonaparta anticipated this and imprisons mother. Twins are born, Bonaparta strips them of their names. Mother swore vengeance on Bonaparta through her twins. Bonaparta somehow falls in love with Mother and starts to regret starting the project, but couldn't stop.

~1980-1984 - Mother moves to Three Frogs apartment in Cedok Bridge in Prague (probably still under surveillance by Bonaparta). Lives with Hellenka Novak, AKA Margot Langer (Shuvald's lover, Karl's mother) for a while. Hellenka successfully crossed into West Germany, while Mother got deported back to Prague. Shuvald visited sometime in 1984, when the twins are still around.

~1984-1985 - Bonaparta sends Capek to pick one of the twins. Mother disguises the boy as a girl to confuse them, but still forced to make a choice of who to send. She sends her girl (Nina).

After being imprisoned in a dark room in the Red Rose Mansion for days, the twin girl (Nina) witnesses the poisoning of 41 people as part of the plan to breed the perfect Monster in her. But Bonaparta, somehow repentent, urges her not to become a Monster. The girl, horrified, runs back to her place.

Only the boy, disguised as a girl, remains. The girl told all of her experience to her twin brother, and thus transferred the Monster into the boy (Johan), who believed her experience in the Mansion to be his.

They burned the apartment and left for the border. There, "Johan" began his killing spree. After falling unconscious on the East German border, they got picked up by General Wolf. Johan got sent to Kinderheim 511 for his abilities (maybe they saw something special about him that would make him the perfect spy). While "Anna" got sent to another orphanage.

1986 - Johan singlehandedly causes the downfall of Kinderheim 511. He got adopted by the diplomat Liebert. Johan insist they adopt his twin sister as well.

Not long after, the Lieberts defected to West Germany and settled in Dusseldorf. Johan kills the Lieberts and asks Anna to shoot him. Anna, still confused, complies and goes into shock afterwards.

Johan got sent to hospital, where Tenma decides to operate on him over the mayor. Tenma got demoted for his insubordination, but Johan "repays" Tenma by killing the hospital chief. And then disappearing with Anna without a trace.

Johan and Anna end up in Heidelberg, where they got adopted by the Fortners. Anna is now known as Nina, and completely loses her memory, while Johan disappears again, beginning his killing spree of his various foster parents.

Bonaparta at this time has kind of grown repentent of his sins and starts living a hermit life in Ruhenheim.

1990 - Johan is about 16. He decided to settle in Munich and get himself adopted by the Lieberts (no relation to the diplomats above), so he can begin to systematically "isolate" Shuvald in order to get close to him. At the same time, he starts the underworld bank for criminals.

1995-1996 - Tenma, now a department head, operates on a criminal who's connected to the serial murders of the middle age couples. He claims he's working under a Monster, and all his accomplices have been silenced by the Monster. Tenma finds out that the Monster is the boy he operated 10 years ago. He tells his story to Inspector Runge of the BKA.

Tenma begins his search for Johan, he ends up in Heidelberg, where he finds Nina, but Johan came early and had the Fortners killed. Nina disappears after forgiving Tenma. Tenma also goes into hiding after Runge marks down Tenma as the prime suspect of the murders.

Tenma and Nina meet again in Frankfurt, where they foil a Neo-Nazi plot to welcome Johan as their leader while also finding out that Johan isn't born with the Monster originally.

1996 - Johan decides to befriend Karl, whom he finds out is Shuvald's illegitimate son, in order to stick by Shuvald. He kills Richard Braun along the way, as Braun got too near to the truth. At this time, he came across Bonaparta's Nameless Monster book and goes into shock, and from then on, his plans have changed from "controlling the world behind the scenes as Shuvald's right hand man" to "searching his own roots".

Tenma, Nina, and Runge all arrive in Munich through various clues, and Tenma manages to prevent the fire Johan started in Shuvald's library from becoming a disaster.

1997 - Under Shuvald's advice, Tenma goes to Prague in search of the twins' mother. Nina and Runge also go to Prague on their own clues. Tenma meets Grimmer, ex Kinderheim 511 orphan, who has obtained the tape containing "secrets of the Monster". However, Johan has gone one step ahead of them and erased vital information in the tape, he left a message for Tenma, saying he now knows where he should go.

After parting with Grimmer, Tenma got arrested and deported back to Germany. He finds out that Roberto, Johan's right hand man, is still alive. Roberto threatens to kill Tenma's ex-fiance Eva, the only other person alive to have seen Johan. Tenma decides to escape in order to save Eva. He obtains clues that Johan is back in Frankfurt with the Neo-Nazis again, and that Capek is a core member.

Despite being attached with the Neo-Nazis, Johan has no intention of working with them, he's only there so that he can find out where Bonaparta is through Capek. In an abanonded mansion near Frankfurt, Nina confronts Johan and finally tells Johan what really happened. Johan, seemingly devastated, begins his "perfect suicide".

Runge and Grimmer meet in Ruhenheim through different clues, and knew that the Monster would start a massacre in order to smoke out Bonaparta who is in hiding here. Tenma and Nina also arrive. Bonaparta and Grimmer lose their lives in the ordeal. Nina, her memory fully recovered, confronts her brother again and "forgives him". But Johan says it is too late, and urges Tenma to kill him.

But Johan got shot by a drunkard trying to save his son from Johan. Runge, after seeing Johan for the first time, now understood Tenma is telling the truth. He urges Tenma to operate on Johan once again. With Runge's influential testimony, Tenma is cleared of all charges.

A few months/years later - Tenma finds the Mother in France, where she says the Monster isn't really Johan, but really in all of us. And she entrusts the twins names to Tenma. Tenma decides to continue his work as a caring doctor, Nina continues her studies as a lawyer, while Johan wakes up from his coma, and disappears in search of his true self, now that he's free from the Monster...

While reading i was hoping that there would be something that might grab my interest.

Some people say monster is underrated, why? I lost interest after watching 20 episodes, is this normal?

Whether you like Monster is up to you, but your post is totally .
This threads concerns the Monster story timeline, not whether the series is underrated or not. Go find or start your own thread concerning this issue.

~1984-1985 - Bonaparta sends Capek to pick one of the twins. Mother disguises the boy as a girl to confuse them <--- I think they already know about the twins, so she's just doing that to cofuse the ppl near by!

After being imprisoned in a dark room in the Red Rose Mansion for days, the twin girl (Nina) witnesses the poisoning of 41 people as part of the plan to breed the perfect Monster in her. But Bonaparta, somehow repentent, urges her not to become a Monster. The girl, horrified, runs back to her place. <-- hmm, He could have killed the ppl without her seeing that, but yes you are right! I still dunno why wasn't all killed back then, I mean still Capek was alive!

Only the boy, disguised as a girl, remains. The girl told all of her experience to her twin brother, and thus transferred the Monster into the boy (Johan), who believed her experience in the Mansion to be his. <-- I guess you're right, but for some reason I feel that Johan became the monster because of what he saw his mother go through .. did you see how angry & horrified she was .. mayeb there was a devil/erge of anger & revenge created in her .. and he became the tool to get the revenge!

They burned the apartment and left for the border. There, "Johan" began his killing spree. After falling unconscious on the East German border, they got picked up by General Wolf. Johan got sent to Kinderheim 511 for his abilities (maybe they saw something special about him that would make him the perfect spy). While "Anna" got sent to another orphanage. <-- I guess that was the only option avilabe for orphan boys, but yes they did see something in him!

1996 - Johan decides to befriend Karl, whom he finds out is Shuvald's illegitimate son, in order to stick by Shuvald. He kills Richard Braun along the way, as Braun got too near to the truth. At this time, he came across Bonaparta's Nameless Monster book and goes into shock. <-- A question mark there, who actually attended the reading sessions, was it Johan or Nina .. I guess it was Nina cuz she was the one who was taken to the Mansion with Capek in the car!

Tenma, Nina, and Runge all arrive in Munich through various clues, and Tenma manages to prevent the fire Johan started in Shuvald's library from becoming a disaster. <-- Here again more ppl have seen Johan, and why didnt' that millionaire report Johan since he saw him burning the library! A big question mark! and wasn't that event taped or something .. no media or whatsoever!
After parting with Grimmer, Tenma got arrested and deported back to Germany. He finds out that Roberto, Johan's right hand man, is still alive. Roberto threatens to kill Tenma's ex-fiance Eva, the only other person alive to have seen Johan <-- maybe to have seen him kill someone!

A few months/years later - Tenma finds the Mother in France. <-- I guess Poppe told Tenma a hint about her whereabouts!

I still have some questions, hope someone will be able to refresh my memory.. ^^;

1. Did the mother leave the children, or did they run away on their own? I don't remember how the mother ended up where she is now. Was she still around Three Frogs when the twins burnt the apartment down?

2. "Twins' father and mother met and decided to run away from experiment."
Were they both chosen students from the reading session? Or just one of them? Which one?

3. What exactly is the vital information on the tape? Do we know? (does anyone remember which episode it was? i want to hear the tape again.. ><)

~1984-1985 - Bonaparta sends Capek to pick one of the twins. Mother disguises the boy as a girl to confuse them <--- I think they already know about the twins, so she's just doing that to cofuse the ppl near by!

Perhaps even to confuse herself, so she doesn't have to make a "choice" as to who will become the Monster.

Quote:

After being imprisoned in a dark room in the Red Rose Mansion for days, the twin girl (Nina) witnesses the poisoning of 41 people as part of the plan to breed the perfect Monster in her. But Bonaparta, somehow repentent, urges her not to become a Monster. The girl, horrified, runs back to her place. <-- hmm, He could have killed the ppl without her seeing that, but yes you are right! I still dunno why wasn't all killed back then, I mean still Capek was alive!

Capek was already in Frankfurt that time (~1980), starting his own reading sessions, which is why he survived. Bonaparta, repentent at what he has started, had wanted to erase everything, but he never expected the Monster to be born there and then.

Quote:

Only the boy, disguised as a girl, remains. The girl told all of her experience to her twin brother, and thus transferred the Monster into the boy (Johan), who believed her experience in the Mansion to be his. <-- I guess you're right, but for some reason I feel that Johan became the monster because of what he saw his mother go through .. did you see how angry & horrified she was .. mayeb there was a devil/erge of anger & revenge created in her .. and he became the tool to get the revenge!

The Monster (in a metaphorical sense) was probably born within the mother's rage and imbued in the twins as she raised them. The Monster is born as Nina witnessed the deaths in the mansion.

Bonaparta had probably hoped that the child would be able to reject the Monster, he even "assured" Nina that she must not become a Monster.

Bonaparta was right in that Nina did reject the Monster, but little did he realize that the Monster did not go away as he intended, but instead went inside Johan.

Quote:

1996 - Johan decides to befriend Karl, whom he finds out is Shuvald's illegitimate son, in order to stick by Shuvald. He kills Richard Braun along the way, as Braun got too near to the truth. At this time, he came across Bonaparta's Nameless Monster book and goes into shock. <-- A question mark there, who actually attended the reading sessions, was it Johan or Nina .. I guess it was Nina cuz she was the one who was taken to the Mansion with Capek in the car!

I think both went to the reading sessions prior to the massacre in the mansion, in which only Nina was "invited".

Quote:

Tenma, Nina, and Runge all arrive in Munich through various clues, and Tenma manages to prevent the fire Johan started in Shuvald's library from becoming a disaster. <-- Here again more ppl have seen Johan, and why didnt' that millionaire report Johan since he saw him burning the library! A big question mark! and wasn't that event taped or something .. no media or whatsoever!

Shuvald was in too much of a shock, and even if he did report Johan, Runge would not have believed him, not yet anyway. And even if Johan is taped, it's pointless, for Johan is good at removing all traces of his existence, as Runge and the cops searched his university apartment and found nothing.

Quote:

A few months/years later - Tenma finds the Mother in France. <-- I guess Poppe told Tenma a hint about her whereabouts!

Go watch the final episode again, Tenma asked Heckler to help him track down the Mother, as seen from Heckler's conversation with Dieter.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nixie

Thanks for this Kinny_Riddle. It seriously helped a lot!

I still have some questions, hope someone will be able to refresh my memory.. ^^;

1. Did the mother leave the children, or did they run away on their own? I don't remember how the mother ended up where she is now. Was she still around Three Frogs when the twins burnt the apartment down?

This is never quite explained. The Mother is nowhere to be seen by the time Nina returned to see Johan. Perhaps the Mother had her revenge set in motion by "abandoning" her kids?

Quote:

2. "Twins' father and mother met and decided to run away from experiment."
Were they both chosen students from the reading session? Or just one of them? Which one?

Neither. Bonaparta chose kids for the reading session, the Father and Mother were already adults when the Monster project began. The Father was arranged to marry the Mother to create the perfect child, ready for the reading sessions.

Quote:

3. What exactly is the vital information on the tape? Do we know? (does anyone remember which episode it was? i want to hear the tape again.. ><)

No one knows for sure, save Johan and Petrov. Rewatching the Prague arc, it is most likely the Neo-Nazis that paid the former Czechoslovak secret police to get their hands on Petrov's tape. Little did the Neo-Nazis (and Capek) expect the Monster would come and see them directly in Frankfurt later on, but the Monster would not be controlled by them.

Kinny Riddle, you're right .. how did I miss that conversation! It was him who got the top secret information of the mother's whereabouts.

Glad someone is paying attention to the details

But If I'm not mistaken, wasn't Capek & Franz the ones who took Nina away to the mansion, and few days later they killed everyone there! well, unless Capek took Nina, then went away, but would Franz allow that!

I don't remember what the connection was between Bonaparta and Kinderheim 511.
What was it?

The teaching concept of Kinderheim 511 was largely based on Bonaparta's personality experiments. Bonaparta no doubt travelled extensively between East Germany and the old Czechoslovakia during the Cold War in order to create the perfect Monster.

Who actually are Bonaparta and Capek working for? Why would they want to start that "create a monster" project back in the 60s? What's their objective? Even if they created a monster, so? Will they turn that person (w/ the monster) into a leader of some sort?

They seem to be important characters, but I don't have a memory block in my head about who they actually are. I probably missed that somewhere.

Who actually are Bonaparta and Capek working for? Why would they want to start that "create a monster" project back in the 60s? What's their objective? Even if they created a monster, so? Will they turn that person (w/ the monster) into a leader of some sort?

They seem to be important characters, but I don't have a memory block in my head about who they actually are. I probably missed that somewhere.

Bonaparta was working for the Czech government and by extension for the USSR, I would venture since they controlled the secret service agencies in the Soviet Block. As any scientist he seemed to be interested mainly in experiments. I'd guess that he wanted to create the ultimate spies like Grimmer or leaders - the remaining members of the Chech secret services seemed to want Johan for their leader. Maybe the main goal of the project was to create a new Stalin, so to speak and the spies project was just a side project? Either my memory fails or it's not too clear. Bonaparta (or was it Chapek?) said that humans could become anything which seems to indicate to the spies project.

I respect your effort to make this timeline.
But I noticed some point. This is my nitpicking. Sorry.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kinny Riddle

~1980-1984 - Mother moves to Three Frogs apartment in Cedok Bridge in Prague (probably still under surveillance by Bonaparta). Lives with Hellenka Novak, AKA Margot Langer (Shuvald's lover, Karl's mother) for a while. Hellenka successfully crossed into West Germany, while Mother got deported back to Prague. Shuvald visited sometime in 1984, when the twins are still around.

Episode 38
from detective report
"Margot Langer, birthname Helenka Novakova,
born August 12th, 1955, in Czechoslovakia.
In 1970, she illegally entered the former
Federal Republic of Germany at the age of 15."

Episode 51
The year Schuwald visit three frogs was 1980.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kinny Riddle

~1984-1985 - Bonaparta sends Capek to pick one of the twins. Mother disguises the boy as a girl to confuse them, but still forced to make a choice of who to send. She sends her girl (Nina).

After being imprisoned in a dark room in the Red Rose Mansion for days, the twin girl (Nina) witnesses the poisoning of 41 people as part of the plan to breed the perfect Monster in her. But Bonaparta, somehow repentent, urges her not to become a Monster. The girl, horrified, runs back to her place.

Episode 57
Wolf said "In 1981, forty-six people vanished without a trace in that mansion."
(But in Episode 67 Johan said "forty-two people there died.")

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kinny Riddle

Capek was already in Frankfurt that time (~1980), starting his own reading sessions, which is why he survived.

Episode 62
Milan said "That man named Petr Capek ... is a devil.
In 1989, just before the communist regime in Czechoslovakia collaped,
he fled to this country."

1996 - Johan decides to befriend Karl, whom he finds out is Shuvald's illegitimate son, in order to stick by Shuvald. He kills Richard Braun along the way, as Braun got too near to the truth. At this time, he came across Bonaparta's Nameless Monster book and goes into shock. <-- A question mark there, who actually attended the reading sessions, was it Johan or Nina .. I guess it was Nina cuz she was the one who was taken to the Mansion with Capek in the car!

Episode 45
from Tape play back
Johan said "I was waiting for Anna. while reading a picture book"

One more thing that should be noted. Poppe's group murdered the Twin's father when he and the mother decided to run away from the experiment. Added more incentive for the mother's vengence against the group.

hello, it's my first post ever in this forum.
i wanted to ask when do u place the training period for tenma and the one for nina.
also, i would like to ask if and when the latest foster parents of Johan where killed (the period when Johan is attending the university , just before joining the blind rich man). As far as i remember, the last time i've seen them is after someone (Giller?) advice them to watch out because they're in danger. But they dont seem to care and watch how beautiful the garden is.
If (as i think) they were never killed at all, this would go againist the logic of Johan conduct.

hello, it's my first post ever in this forum.
i wanted to ask when do u place the training period for tenma and the one for nina.
also, i would like to ask if and when the latest foster parents of Johan where killed (the period when Johan is attending the university , just before joining the blind rich man). As far as i remember, the last time i've seen them is after someone (Giller?) advice them to watch out because they're in danger. But they dont seem to care and watch how beautiful the garden is.
If (as i think) they were never killed at all, this would go againist the logic of Johan conduct.

First off, welcome to the AS forums.

Now, concerning the training, if you go back to episodes 8, 9 and 18, you will find that a five-month period has passed since Tenma slipped out of the Dusseldorf hospital unnoticed by Renge's police unit. During those five months, Tenma was trained in shooting by the once mercenary Hugo (the big guy with the young Asian girl whose parents he killed), and Nina undertook self-training while working for Mr.Rosso (ep18, sniper guy who owns a restaurant). Nina actually wanted to hire the former hitman Rosso, but could never ask him to. (They explain to each other why they could not bring up the topic near the end of that episode.) Anyways, Nina was training at that time she was working as a waitress for Ross. During the flashbacks, you see her with a gun at a shooting range.

About Johan and his last foster parents, I think that was right before everything fast forwarded to 1995, so earlier that year. In the beginning of the second half of episode 3 after the nine or ten years fast forward, you hear the detectives discussing yet another murder of a childless middle-class couple. I believe that was when Johan moved onto life in Munich and university.